Two-Year-Old Girl Gets Life-Saving Trachea Transplant Made From Her Own Stem Cells

An amazing story at today's New York Times, "Groundbreaking Surgery for Girl Born Without Windpipe":

PEORIA, Ill. — Using plastic fibers and human cells, doctors have built and implanted a windpipe in a 2 ½-year-old girl — the youngest person ever to receive a bioengineered organ.

The surgery, which took place on April 9 here at Children’s Hospital of Illinois and will be formally announced Tuesday, is only the sixth of its kind and the first to be performed in the United States. It was approved by the Food and Drug Administration under rules that allow experimental procedures when otherwise the patient has little hope of survival.

Dr. Paolo Macchiarini, a specialist in the field of regenerative medicine who developed the windpipe and led the complex nine-hour operation, said the treatment of the Korean-Canadian toddler, Hannah Warren, made him realize that this approach to building organs may work best with children, by harnessing their natural ability to grow and heal.

“Hannah’s transplant has completely changed my thinking about regenerative medicine,” said Dr. Macchiarini, a surgeon at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. He said he would like to proceed with a clinical trial in the United States, something that critics of his approach have called for.

Hannah was born without a windpipe, or trachea — an extremely rare condition that is eventually fatal in 99 percent of cases — and had lived since birth in a newborn intensive care unit in a Korean hospital, breathing through a tube inserted in her mouth. Because of other developmental problems, she cannot eat normally and cannot speak.

Nearly three weeks after the surgery, the girl is acting playfully with her doctors and nurses, at one point smiling and waving goodbye to a group of visitors. Dr. Mark Holterman, a pediatric surgeon at the hospital, said that Hannah was breathing largely on her own, although through a hole in her neck, not through her mouth yet. “She’s doing well,” he said. “She had some complications from the surgery, but the trachea itself is doing great.”

Dr. Macchiarini described a look of befuddlement on the child’s face when she realized that the mouth tube was gone and she could put her lips together for the first time. “It was beautiful,” he said.

The goal of regenerative medicine, or tissue engineering, is to create or regrow tissues and organs to ease transplant shortages or treat conditions that do not have an effective cure. After years of scant progress, tissue engineers have begun to make advances as they have gained a better understanding of the role that stem cells — basic cells that can become tissue-specific ones — play in signaling the body to grow and repair itself...

To make Hannah’s windpipe, Dr. Macchiarini’s team made a half-inch diameter tube out of plastic fibers, bathed it in a solution containing stem cells taken from the child’s bone marrow and incubated it in a shoebox-size device called a bioreactor.

Doctors are not sure exactly what happens after implantation, but think that the stem cells signal the body to send other cells to the windpipe, which then sort out so the appropriate tissues grow on the inside and outside of the tube. Because the windpipe uses only the child’s own cells, there is no need for drugs to suppress the patient’s immune system to avoid rejection of the implant.

Continue reading.

Kelly Andrews at Egotastic!

A lovely British glamour model out of Liverpool.

See: "Kelly Andrews White Lace Body Suit Striptease."

Seven Dead in Horrific Cargo Plane Crash in Afghanistan

At London's Daily Mail, "The horrific moment cargo plane dropped out of the sky before crashing in fireball - killing seven Americans in Afghanistan."

Fox News Runs Branco Cartoon From Legal Insurrection

Kudos to William Jacobson and A.F. Branco, "Branco’s Chris Matthews cartoon on Fox News":

And that Fox News segment is right here: "Boston Bombings Coverage - Media Credibility Hurt By Errors? - Wake Up America!"

The Death of Collaboration in the Independent Blogosphere

Robert Stacy McCain published an interesting post the other day, "Where Were You in 2002?"

He's asking about where folks were 11 years ago when the independent blogosphere was the vital forum for news reporting and analysis independent of the mainstream media. 2002's a long time ago. I don't think I was reading blogs intentionally at that point. It was still early in my career at LBCC and I was focused mostly on teaching and  research in political science. It was Dan Drezner's 2004 blogging piece in Foreign Policy that turned me on to the blogosphere and there's been no turning back (see, "Web of Influence"). At that time I was reading Drezner and Virginia Postrel. A little later Althouse became my favorite blog, and by 2006 I decided to get my blogging feet wet. American Power went live in October 2007. I've had a good run so far and I expect to be plugging away until I get bored or the progressives are successful in getting me fired. (Hell, that wouldn't stop me anyway, so WTF).

I've never considered myself an influential blogger (although my inbox, filled with all kinds of free books and promotions from publishers and blog newbies, often tells me otherwise). It was during the 2007 GOP primaries when I got really serious about having an impact and in 2008, when John McCain won the Republican nomination, I felt some vindication for my efforts. One result was that I got picked up by RealClearPolitics later that year. But honestly, I've had more fun these last few years following The Other McCain's advice on "How to Get a Million Hits on Your Blog in Less Than a Year." Sure, the babe blogging around here's become a major pastime, but actually, the idea of building community through "reciprocal linkage" has been one of the more important elements of my program. Folks need to exercise the "The Full Metal Jacket Reach-Around":

Reciprocal linkage is the essential lubricant that makes the blogosphere purr with contentment. If somebody's throwing you traffic, you should either (a) give them a link-back update, or at a minimum (b) keep them in mind for future linkage. Because you don't want to end up on the wrong end of a kharmic unbalance in the 'sphere, where you're always taking and never giving.

As blogging has become almost exclusively professionalized in the last few years, the notion of "The Full Metal Jacket Reach-Around" seems kind of quaint. But don't be fooled. We've still got lots of independent bloggers out there doing what the mainstream press refuses to do. For example, Robert mentions Professor William Jacobson's Legal Insurrection as a model of high-impact professional blogging to which we should all aspire. And of course Glenn Reynolds continues to plug away at Instapundit, resisting the lucrative lure of a huge corporate sponsor (even more lucrative, that is, as Glenn's already got great model of monetization). There are lots more examples --- and apologies to some of the great new blogs, like Rebel Pundit and SOOPER Mexican, for not highlighting their work more often --- although it's clear there are increasing sustainability issues for smaller "mom and pop" blogging outfits. Here's how Robert describes the problem at The Other McCain:

This network/community concept seems to have been lost by (or, more likely, was never known to) newer arrivals in the ‘sphere. The idea that each of us is contributing to a common project is not just some kind of “Stone Soup” idealism, but is in fact the only way to build any genuinely meaningful alternative to that pathetic exercise in groupthink we call the Mainstream Media. Bloggers who don’t help build the alternative can complain about the MSM “borg” all they want; they aren’t really making a difference. There are two ways in which bloggers actually help sabotage the blogosphere:

Turn your blog into a series of lectures...

Never link another blogger. It’s weird that some bloggers would rather link a story in the New York Times or the Washington Post than to link a fellow blogger. Why this is, I don’t know. Sometimes it seems like everybody has the same idea: Grab an MSM headline off Drudge, link it, include a brief blockquote and add some political snark. Not only does this effectively surrender content control to Drudge — so that bloggers are merely replicating the headline selection there — but nobody’s snark ever goes beyond their own readership, because no blogger ever quotes another blogger.

Be sure to read the rest for additional insight.

Those bloggers who "never link another blogger" are the kinds I generally avoid. Sure, few bloggers can worry about linking all their buddies all the time, but throwing some hits to your friends once in a while is the friendly thing to do, especially when you've been a mensch yourself, linking and forwarding your posts with breaking news and so forth. Which is why I was surprised yesterday at popular pro-life blogger Jill Stanek. I woke up about 4:00am and wrote a post on WND's piece on Planned Parenthood's grotesque sex education promotions ("Sex-ed cartoons 'too graphic' for N.Y. Times." I later tweeted it to Robert and cc'd Jill:

.@rsmccain Planned Parenthood Sex Education Graphics Too Grisly for the New York Times is.gd/HBetXJ @jillstanek @directorblue
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) April 29, 2013

Then checking back on Twitter about an hour later I see Jill in my timeline with a new blog post:

Ew, gross! @nytimes,@washingtonpost reject THIS @amerlifeleague ad of Planned Parenthood sex ed images jillstanek.com/?p=122100
— Jill Stanek (@JillStanek) April 29, 2013

Jill's post is time-stamped at 4:14pm in the afternoon, 1:14pm Pacific time, 50 minutes after I tweeted my link to her. Now, perhaps Jill had her entry all queued up or was already familiar with WND's reporting. I don't know. I can say that Jill isn't a big proponent of the Full Metal Reach Around community-building strategy. I've sent her lots of stuff in the past and have been linked perhaps a couple of times at her blog. I don't know. Perhaps she wanted to have this Planned Parenthood "scoop" all to herself, with no hat tip to WND, much less myself. That's how some bloggers roll. It's not the best way to build community, in any case.

Again, maybe Jill got that post going without ever seeing my tweet. But if it were me, I'd probably have replied on Twitter in the first place and then posted a hat tip if I blogged it. Your mileage may vary.

Either way, I couldn't help thinking that yesterday was one good example of the lack of collaboration in the blogosphere. And it's not an insignificant issue. Now more than ever American democracy needs alternative voices. American politics needs citizens to upend the establishment narrative. People frankly need to build on the social media revolution to bring greater accountability to government at at time when the press has abdicated its historic role as freedom's watchdog. Bloggers are upsetting and will continue to upset the accepted memes and force big media to report real news that's important to real Americans. Along with other forms of citizens' social media, blogs promote accountability and deliberation. William Jacobson had something on that yesterday, "If not for prior #Gosnell Twitter campaign, would MSM be covering Bronx and DC revelations?"

But "social" means you can't do it alone. The best of the top bloggers recognize the vital role newbies play in keeping the 'sphere an essential place for alternative reporting. And new bloggers entering the arena might heed the warnings of The Other McCain (and others) on the dangers of the death of collaboration in the independent blogosphere.

Review of the Rolling Stones at Echo Park Nightclub in Hollywood

I mentioned the surprise gig earlier.

Randall Roberts has a review at the Los Angeles Times, "Rolling Stones invade Echo Park, perform an hour of classics":

How was the gig? How the hell do you think it was?

It was the Stones in a little club, and for most in attendance, a dream come true.

That's how it was.

More here, a raw video of "Brown Sugar" from the show.

Blogger for CBS Houston Attacks 'Chunky' NBA Cheerleader Kelsey Williams

Chunky?

She's pretty smokin' actually.

But see PuffHo, "NBA Cheerleader 'Too Chunky'? CBS Houston Blogger Sparks Outrage For Questioning Kelsey Williams' Figure (PHOTO)," and at International Business Times, "Is Kelsey Williams Fat? Claire Crawford Blogs NBA Cheerleader Is ‘Too Chunky’ to Wear Oklahoma City Thunder Uniform."

Helen Mirren Named Best Actress at Olivier Awards 2013

At the Independent UK, "Olivier Awards 2013: Dame Helen Mirren rules the West End as she wins for another portrayal of the Queen - but Curious Incident team are top dog."

RELATED: At the Wrap, "'RED 2' Trailer: Helen Mirren at Her Deadliest (Video)."

I'm looking forward to that.

Benghazi Report Revives Troubling Questions

From Michael Barone, at RCP:

"What difference, at this point, does it make?"

That was former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's angry response to a question about the State Department's account of the attack on the Benghazi consulate where Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans were murdered on Sept. 11, 2012.

Her response was cheered by leftist commentators on MSNBC. Righteous indignation is so attractive.

But of course it makes a difference. Hillary Clinton is leading in polls for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination and general election. It's always legitimate to examine the performance of a front-runner for the presidency. And of the president himself.

You can find such an examination in the Interim Progress Report that five House Republican committee chairmen released last Wednesday.

Democrats complain that this is a partisan effort. Sure, but Democrats are free to present their own view of the facts. My sense is that they would rather squelch critical examination of Benghazi and the Obama administration's response, as they did with the help of most of the press during the 2012 presidential campaign.

No doubt.

There's more at that top link.

PREVIOUSLY: "Obama Administration Threatened Whistleblowers on Benghazi (VIDEO)."

Fabulous Claudia Romani Bikini Hotness

Here's some lovely bikini blogging for the evening, at London's Dailly Mail, "Did you forget something? Italian model Claudia Romani nips out for a walk in Miami wearing a tiny black bikini."

Obama Administration Threatened Whistleblowers on Benghazi (VIDEO)

New explosive allegations out tonight.

At Greta Wire, "THREATS AGAINST BENGHAZI WHISTLEBLOWERS ALLEGED":

At least four career officials at the State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency have retained lawyers, or are in the process of doing so, as they prepare to provide sensitive information about the Benghazi attacks to Congress, Fox News has learned.

Victoria Toensing, a former Justice Department official and Republican counsel to the Senate intelligence committee, is now representing one of the State Department employees. She told Fox News her client and some of the others, who consider themselves whistleblowers, have been threatened by unnamed Obama administration officials.

“I’m not talking generally, I’m talking specifically about Benghazi – that people have been threatened,” Toensing said in an interview Monday. “And not just the State Department. People have been threatened at the CIA.”

Toensing declined to name her client. She also refused to say whether the individual was on the ground in Benghazi on the night of September 11, 2012, when terrorist attacks on two U.S. installations in the Libyan city killed four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens.

However, Toensing disclosed that her client has pertinent information on all three time periods investigators consider relevant to the attacks: the months that led up to September 11, when pleas by the ambassador and his staff for enhanced security in Benghazi were mostly rejected by senior officers at the State Department; the eight-hour time frame in which the attacks unfolded; and the eight-day period that followed the attacks, when Obama administration officials falsely described them as the result of a spontaneous protest over a video.

Continue reading.

Also at Newsmax, "Administration Blocking Benghazi Whistleblowers."

Tsarnaevs' 'Troubled Trail' Gets More Objective Treatment at the Los Angeles Times

Following up from yesterday's report, "Because Frustrated Boxing Aspirations Are So Horrible That Murdering Americans in Jihad Bombings is Totally Understandable, or Something."

Here's the front-page story at yesterday's Los Angeles Times, which eschews the heavy causal implications employed by the New York Times, "The Tsarnaev brothers' troubled trail to Boston":

Anzor Tsarnaev was tough, a championship boxer back home, and he wanted his oldest boy to be tough too.

Rain or shine, like a scene from "Rocky," the wiry Chechen immigrant would ride his bicycle as his son Tamerlan jogged to a Boston-area boxing gym, pushing him to run faster, to punch harder.

"He was his trainer, basically," said Joe Timko, Anzor's supervisor at Webster Auto Body, a corner repair shop in Somerville. "And he was an old Russian soldier. He'd make him run for miles."

Armed with a good left jab and powerful right, "Tam," as friends called him, climbed the ranks in regional tournaments and dreamed of joining the U.S. Olympic boxing team. At home, a crowded third-floor walk-up, he showed off by doing chin-ups outside. At night, he played the piano and accordion.

But by 2009, Tamerlan's life abruptly changed course. He told his parents that "the Koran prohibits beating people in the face." He grew a beard, began to pray more than five times a day, dropped out of college and gave up stylish leather pants for sweat pants. He argued with friends over politics, picked a fight at a pizza parlor, shouted at speakers at a mosque.

"He gave up drinking and smoking, and he even gave up boxing he loved so much," said his mother, Zubeidat Tsarnaeva. Anzor Tsarnaev said he was brainwashed by religion.

His uncle, Ruslan Tsarni, asked why he didn't get a job.

"I'm doing bigger things," Tamerlan told him that August. "Now I'm with God. Now I'm happy."

Tamerlan, 26, died nine days ago after he and his 19-year-old brother, Dzhokhar, were in a shootout with police. Dzhokhar is in custody at a medical facility for prisoners on federal charges that he planted one of the two nail-filled bombs that exploded near the finish line of the Boston Marathon on April 15.

Investigators are convinced both brothers carried out the plot, which killed three people and wounded more than 260. Yet it did not appear meticulously planned. Authorities say they planted homemade bombs in full view of surveillance cameras, and when their pictures emerged three days later, they tried to flee with no cash, no disguises and one firearm. Officials say that they killed an MIT police officer for his pistol but couldn't figure out how to unlock the holster.

Now investigators are struggling to understand: How did a cocky young athlete and his skateboard-riding brother, if authorities are correct, become do-it-yourself Islamist terrorists?

Read it all at the link.

It's an old-fashioned piece of journalism, although the difference between the New York Times' hack report yesterday is dramatic.

Planned Parenthood Sex Education Graphics Too Grisly for the New York Times

WND reports on the All American Life League's full-page advertisement that was rejected by the New York Times, "Sex-ed cartoons 'too graphic' for N.Y. Times."

Here's the ALL.org website. And the group's ad is at this PDF.

ALL.org says Planned Parenthood's materials are based on the Robie Harris book, "It's Perfectly Normal Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex and Sexual Health."

Read all about it at the links. And I'll tell you, I couldn't even put that stuff up on an overhead in my classes at the college. But no doubt Planned Parenthood wants to put this stuff before your elementary school children. Way to go progs!

Because Frustrated Boxing Aspirations Are So Horrible That Murdering Americans in Jihad Bombings is Totally Understandable, or Something

Here's the front-page report at today's New York Times, "A Battered Dream, Then a Violent Path."

And some of the reactions:

* At Atlas Shrugs, "THE NEW YORK TIMES WAGES JIHAD ON THE TRUTH: BOSTON BOMBER WENT JIHAD BECAUSE THE GOLDEN GLOVES CHANGED THEIR RULES."

* At Blazing Cat Fur, "Shocka! New York Times Article Blames Boston Bombing On America."

* At Israel Matzav, "NY Times: 'If we'd let Tamerlan become a citizen despite being an Islamist and beating his girlfriend, he wouldn't have blown up the Marathon'."

You've got to read the piece. It's like seriously?

BOSTON — It was a blow the immigrant boxer could not withstand: after capturing his second consecutive title as the Golden Gloves heavyweight champion of New England in 2010, Tamerlan Anzorovich Tsarnaev, 23, was barred from the national Tournament of Champions because he was not a United States citizen.

The cocksure fighter, a flamboyant dresser partial to white fur and snakeskin, had been looking forward to redeeming the loss he suffered the previous year in the first round, when the judges awarded his opponent the decision, drawing boos from spectators who considered Mr. Tsarnaev dominant.

From one year to the next, though, the tournament rules had changed, disqualifying legal permanent residents — not only Mr. Tsarnaev, who was Soviet-born of Chechen and Dagestani heritage, but several other New England contenders, too. His aspirations frustrated, he dropped out of boxing competition entirely, and his life veered in a completely different direction.

Mr. Tsarnaev portrayed his quitting as a reflection of the sport’s incompatibility with his growing devotion to Islam. But as dozens of interviews with friends, acquaintances and relatives from Cambridge, Mass., to Dagestan showed, that devotion, and the suspected radicalization that accompanied it, was a path he followed most avidly only after his more secular dreams were dashed in 2010 and he was left adrift.

His trajectory eventually led the frustrated athlete and his loyal younger brother, Dzhokhar, to bomb one of the most famous athletic events in this country, killing three and wounding more than 200 at the Boston Marathon, the authorities say. They say it led Mr. Tsarnaev, his application for citizenship stalled, and his brother, a new citizen and a seemingly well-adjusted college student, to attack their American hometown on Patriots’ Day, April 15.

Hey, no doubt.

Who could miss the inevitable causal relationship! It must have been horrible. Horrible! Whaaaaa!!! Next time life throws up a roadblock I think I'll run out and buy a pressure cooker, some gun powder, a few boxes of carpenter's nails and some ball bearings. Now where are are my old copies of Inspire?

Progressives Launch Anti-Koch Brothers Jihad on Rumors of Tribune Company Sale to Billionaire Brothers

From Michael Calderone, at PuffHo, "Koch Brothers Media Strategy, Political Agenda Raise Concerns Over Tribune Ownership."

The LA Weekly first reported news of the Kochs' possible interest in Tribune newspapers last month. But a Sunday front-page New York Times story describing a strategy of using media to promote free-market policy ideas prompted Tribune journalists to speak out, both anonymously and on the record. Clarence Page, a liberal Chicago Tribune columnist who opposes Koch ownership, said the Kochs “seem to be coming in upfront with the idea of using a major news media as a vehicle for their political voice."

This week's outcry is reminiscent of Wall Street Journal staffers’ fears in May 2007 as Rupert Murdoch, the conservative mogul behind Fox News and the New York Post, bid for the august broadsheet parent-company, Dow Jones. While the Journal’s framing of political and policy stories sometimes tilts more to the right, journalists’ worst fears of right-wing tabloidization of the newsroom never came to pass. But the response to Koch ownership is different six years later in that journalists are now pining for Murdoch.

“Murdoch, for all his flaws, is a newspaper man. The Kochs are not,” a Chicago Tribune journalist told media writer Jim Romenesko. “I have no faith in their belief in the importance of a free and robust watchdog press. Frankly, such a press seems antithetical to their goals and harmful to their influence in the political process.”

Steven Pearlstein, a Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post writer, suggested Thursday that Tribune Co. staffers band together to oppose any sale to the Kochs.

Because nothing promotes robust debate and deliberation like leftist campaigns to squelch competing views.

More at the link.

And who knew? There's a whole website set up to fight the smears. See, "Mother Jones Gets It Wrong… Again."

Well, yeah, Mother Jones has been getting it wrong quite a bit lately, the idiots.

RELATED: At Neiman Labs, "The newsonomics of the Koch Brothers and the sales of U.S.' top metros."

Sunday Cartoons

At Flopping Aces, "Sunday Funnies."

Also at Jill Stanek's, "Stanek Sunday funnies 4-28-13," and Reaganite Republican, "Reaganite's SUNDAY FUNNIES."

And see Randy's Roundtable, "Friday Nite Funnies," and Theo Spark, "Cartoon Round Up..."

BONUS: At Legal Insurrection, "Branco Cartoon – Hard Boiled."

CARTOON CREDIT: William Warren.

Jessica Davies for Loaded Magazine

Via Twitter:

Shot from my @loadedmag spread x twitter.com/_JessicaDavies…
— Jessica Davies (@_JessicaDavies) April 28, 2013

And at Egotastic!, "Jessica Davies for Loaded Magazine April 2013."

Celebrating Babies

At iOWNTHEWORLD.

Salon's Geller-Obsessives Shill for Islamic Supremacy

You know, it'd actually be hilarious if it wasn't so perverted.

The far-left trolls are relentless in their endless politics of personal destruction. Few folks know this better than Pamela Geller, but every time she shows them out as sh-t-eating dregs of humanity who have no business even commenting on the most grievous threats facing the nation.

At Atlas Shrugs "@Salon's Greatest Hits."

Pamela first smacks down the idiot Alex "Ping Pong Balls" Pareene, and then continues:

Has Salon learned anything? No. And then there is this: the obsessed troll, Alex Seitz-Wald, ran this headline after the Boston bombings.

Read the whole thing.

Again, this kind of epic left-wing juvenility would be mostly mock-worthy if it wasn't so fiendish. Leftists turn their disagreement with Pamela into a Manichean crusade to destroy her. And she has a lot of help from the legions of deranged progressive trolls prowling the Internet. People of decency and faith must continually redouble their efforts at beating back these scummy leftist enemies from within.

NYT's Mark Leibovich Slams White House Correspondents' Dinner

A great clip.

Leibovich hammers Washington's entitled celebrity class, which partied last night at the exclusive correspondents' dinner:

Leibovich discusses his forthcoming book, "This Town: The Way it Works in Suck Up City."

And see Politico, "'This Town': A Washington takedown."

Plus, at Twitchy, "Tweet like a girl: Sarah Palin blasts ‘DC assclowns’ at ‘pathetic’ Correspondents’ Dinner." (The responses to Palin on Twitter have been utterly pathological.) And at Memeorandum.

BONUS: At The Other McCain, "Have You Heard the One About the President Who Was a Miserable Failure?"

Robert Downey Jr. Sprained His Ankle Last Year While Filming the Finale of 'Iron Man 3' in Wilmington, N.C.

Iron Man's my favorite super hero, and my youngest boy's into the franchise, so it's a win-win situation. The film opens next Friday.

The Los Angeles Times reports on some of the challenges of finishing the production, "‘Iron Man 3′: Tony Stark lives by his wits in Marvel’s latest":

It was the moment that brought a $200-million blockbuster to a screeching halt.

Robert Downey Jr. stood frozen in pain after leaping onto a platform of an oil tanker on the Wilmington, N.C., soundstage where “Iron Man 3” was shooting its fiery finale last year. The actor had made ambitious wire jumps for stunt scenes before, but this time was different. The impact of the landing left him with an ankle sprain so severe he was unable to walk for seven weeks.

“I was feeling a little bit invincible, I guess,” Downey said last week while making the promotional rounds for “Iron Man 3,” which rockets into theaters on May 3. “I checked it out, and I was like, ‘Oh, we got this.’ And we didn’t have it.”

When it comes to playing Tony Stark, the genius-billionaire-playboy-inventor whom Downey first brought to the screen in 2008’s record-breaking “Iron Man,” the Oscar-nominated actor could be forgiven for overreaching.

More at the link.

Rolling Stones Play Surprise Gig at Hollywood's Echo Park Nightclub

One lady walked out of the show quipping, "Best bar band ever."

That would have been great.

At LAT, "Rolling Stones rock Echo Park club in surprise 'warm up' gig."

Bomb Couldn't Stop Bill Iffrig

An awesome column, from Chris Erskine, at the Los Angeles Times, "Bomb blast couldn't keep him down in Boston":

If anything proves that you will get up off the ground after being knocked down, it's getting up off the ground after being knocked down ... in an apparent terrorist attack, at the tender age of 78, hell's bells ringing in your ears.

If anyone should make us feel good about our better selves, it's Bill Iffrig, a carpenter by trade, but a man who made history with his feet in Boston, the town where America was born.

Fifteen wobbly steps to the finish. Fifteen wobbly steps to moving on.

More at the link.

Dennis Miller Just Tears Into #Boston Jihad Family on O'Reilly Factor

He calls out O'Reilly too.

An awesome segment, via Kathy Shaidle, "‘Obama Doesn’t Care About Dead Children’":

Oh My! Judge Jeanine Pirro Slams Psycho Jihad Mom Zubeidat Tsarnaeva

Oh my goodness the Judge is on fire!

Don't miss a word of this pissed off rant just destroying the hypocrisy, entitlement, and evil of Ms. Tsarnaeva:

Russia Had Wiretap on Suspect Tamerlan Plotting With Jihad Mom Zubeidat Tsarnaev

Man, jihad mom is into the hardcore terror program.

And Tamerlan was getting tips from the old lady.

At BCF, "Officials say Russian wiretap caught suspicious call between Boston Bomber & Mama Tsarnaev."

Added: At Pamela's, "RUSSIA HAD WIRETAP ON BOSTON SUSPECT, DISCUSSING JIHAD WITH MOM":

The FBI is whining now that they didn't get more info from the Russians? Sorry, fellas, do your own surveillance and investigative work. They are obviously getting their whining cues from Obama.

They are not allowed to be lazy when it comes to protecting American lives on American soil. O's priorities.

Genocide in Syria?

If it's genocide, the U.S. is obliged to act, says Anne Marie Slaughter, at the Washington Post, "Obama should remember Rwanda as he weighs action in Syria."

She's calling for humanitarian intervention, regime change frankly. It's a human rights argument. Leftists can get behind that kind of stuff. Just not intervention for raw realpolitik. That's criminal.

Related: See Michael Burleigh, at London's Daily Mail, "Horrific - but sending troops to Syria would be a catastrophe."

Jodie Gasson Saturday Rule 5

On Twitter:

Just updated my blog :) jodiegasson.com/tour xx twitter.com/Jodie_Gasson/s…
— Jodie Holly Gasson (@Jodie_Gasson) April 25, 2013

Bob Belvedere's got the babe-blogging roundup: "Rule 5 News: 27 April 2013 A.D."

Plus, bonus flashback: "Jodie Gasson Topless Pictures at Egotastic!"

Bagram Batman

This is cool!

At the Wall Street Journal, "A Superheroic Caped Crusade to Keep Troops Safe in Afghanistan: Bagram Batman TV Spots Educate Military; 'He Acts Just as Well as Adam West Did'":

BAGRAM AIR FIELD, Afghanistan—In fictional Gotham City, Batman protects citizens from crime. Here, at the largest U.S. base in Afghanistan, another Dark Knight is on a different kind of crusade: making sure soldiers carry their rifles and don't get run over at night.

"Bagram Batman" is the star of a recent series of public-service announcements broadcast to troops deployed in and around Afghanistan. The camouflaged superhero—and his catchphrase, "SWEAR TO ME!"— have become an unlikely hit, winning a cult following among soldiers, and going viral on the Internet.

"He acts just as well as Adam West did," marvels Maj. Crispin Burke, an Army officer and military blogger, referring to the star of the original Batman movie and TV series in the 1960s.

While his do-it-yourself costume—rubber Batman mask, black cape and reflective belt over combat fatigues—may look like a joke, Bagram Batman has a very real mission: reminding the troops about the do's and don'ts of life on a forward operating base like Bagram, a small American town planted in the middle of a war zone.

Continue reading.

Gwyneth Paltrow: 'I have to work out Monday through Friday for almost two hours, and it's a nightmare...'

Says Ms. Paltrow, at People Magazine, when asked about how great she looks and how "it's easy to see  why women could be intimidated by you now." The full interview is hard copy only. My wife's a subscriber, however. Here's one of the photos from the magazine:

More: "Gwyneth Paltrow: My Family Makes Me Feel Beautiful."

Plus, at CNN, "Paltrow: 'Most beautiful' title not true," and at US Weekly, "Gwyneth Paltrow Feels "Humiliated" After Ditching Underwear at Iron Man 3 Premiere."

I'll have more babe-blogging later!

PREVIOUSLY: "Gwyneth Paltrow — 'World's Most Beautiful Woman' — Shows Off Smokin' See-Through Mesh Panel Gown at Hollywood Premiere of 'Iron Man 3'."

Walter James Casper III = Certified NPR Tinfoil Conspiracy Crackpot

OMG, this is getting too ridiculous.

Deranged tinfoil stalker Walter James Casper III keeps spinning his lies about the idiot Dina Temple-Raston at NPR. He keeps telling us to "read the transcript, read the transcript," blah, blah -- which when you actually read the transcript only proves my point that Temple-Raston was spewing lies about "right wing individuals." In contrast to Tinfoil Rim-Station Repsac's claim, this Temple-Raston NPR sleazebag wasn't focusing on "all the possibilities" for suspects in the attack. She was systematically scoffing at the prospect that anything other than "right wing individuals" would have been the perpetrators, and this is despite the so-called statements of the "officials" she keeps throwing out there without any substantiation.

The question is not whether the Saudi student taken to the hospital was a legitimate suspect, but the possibility that anyone of Muslim background, as in a "Saudi national," could be the suspect. According to the transcript, these so-called unnamed officials told her that "nothing is ruled out at this point." Hate-bagger Walter James Casper can cherry-pick all he wants, but Temple-Raston is not reporting when she starts spewing about the right wing. She's adding her own commentary.

But the Saudi student is not issue. Repsac focuses on that because he's hopelessly pinned down on the main argument, which is that the left was scapegoating the right wing for the attacks, and Temple-Raston's smears were among the worst. She wouldn't legitimately consider the possibility of a Muslim bomber. She's spewing racist attacks, smearing conservatives, which is why hate-bagger Repsac is defending her to the death, the facts be damned. She completely blew off the possibility that the homemade pressure-cooker bomb could have been assembled by a Muslim terrorist using the al-Qaeda training manual. Again, Tinfoil Rim-Station Repsac keeps telling us to "read the transcript," so let's read the transcript:

MELISSA BLOCK: OK. What about the explosives themselves? We've been hearing about pressure cookers today.

DINA TEMPLE-RASTON: Yes. Well, basically, it's one of those pots that you use often to cook rice, and pressure cooker bombs have traditionally been used by young jihadists to get bomb training in Afghan training comps. An al-Qaida online magazine called Inspire provided instructions on how to build pressure cooker bombs, but that doesn't necessarily mean that this is a foreign plot.

Instructions on the how to make this kind of bomb is all over the Web. In fact, white supremacists, on their website, have linked to the Inspire magazine directions to make this bomb. So officials are telling me that we should be careful not to read too much into that.

BLOCK: And what are officials telling you about how easy it would be to make a pressure cooker bomb like the ones we saw in Boston?

TEMPLE-RASTON: They're pretty easy to make. I mean, basically, you put in explosives like TNT into the pressure cooker.

Message to Hate-Monger Racist Tinfoil Rim-Station Repsac3: You said read the transcript. I did --- indeed, I'm deconstructing it for you and your deranged terror enabling mind. In spite of the fact that these so-called officials told her that "nothing was ruled out" at this point, Temple-Raston willfully blew off the possibility that indeed it was Islamic terrorists cribbing al-Qaeda bomb instructions to assemble a pressure cooker bomb in an evil plot to kill Americans in Boston. The key line is all this about how instructions are "all over the Web." Thus she implies anyone could make one of these, especially the alleged Hitler's birthday-celebrating "right wing individuals" that this lady maliciously pegs as the perpetrators in Boston. Sickening.

But of course we know what happened now. The Tsarnaevs were not only "inspired" by the al-Qaeda bomb designs, the elder Tamerlan may well have had hands-on bomb-building training in Chechnya, as I reported earlier: "Sophisticated Bomb Design Indicates Tamerlan Tsarnaev May Have Received Weapons Training in Chechnya."

It's not hard, Racist Repsac3. All it requires is a bit of decency and honestly. No, the left was not "considering all the possibilities." No it wasn't just Michael Moore intent to pin this attack on conservatives. It was an across-the-board leftist attack on the right, chronicled all over the place but which you conveniently ignore because it shows you to be a pathological liar. It was Dina Temple-Raston. It was Chris Matthews. It was Tom Brokaw. It was MSNBC. And it was you. You are a terror enabler sowing disinformation to defend the left's America-hating propaganda attacks on conservatives. It happens every time, "blame righty." And every time you lie and distort the truth in a sickening attempt to exonerate your pus-filled progressive ideology. In the words of Robert Spencer, writing at FrontPage Magazine, you are "Excusing Jihad In Boston":

If the Boston bombers really had been Bible-quoting Christian fanatics, none of that [blame-righty disinformation] would actually have happened at all. Instead, the media feeding frenzy would have been intense. The air waves would have been full of earnest examinations of how the Bible is full of material that constitutes incitement to violence, recommendations of what the churches and Christian leaders must do to make sure that this kind of attack never happens again, and story after story about bright, attractive young people who got mixed up with church groups and ended up with their lives and the lives of everyone around them in ruins.

But of course, the bombers weren’t Christians; they were Muslims, acting explicitly in the name of Islam. Media analysts, when they have deigned to take notice of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s statement at all, have scratched their heads in puzzlement over how he and his brother could have gotten the idea that murdering innocent people at a sporting event could possibly constitute any kind of defense of Islam. However, they wouldn’t be so puzzled if they knew that the Qur’an exhorts Muslims to use the “steeds of war” to “strike terror into the hearts of the enemies of Allah” (8:60) – and that al-Qaeda has recently recommended bombing sporting events as a nicely effective way to strike terror into the hearts of the enemies of Allah.

The mainstream media has no interest in how the Qur’an may incite those who believe it is the word of Allah to commit acts of violence against those who do not so believe. And so it was that the Atlantic Wire’s story was actually about why it scarcely mattered that the bombers were Muslim, and Chris Matthews was declaring that the bombers’ inspirations and motivations made no difference, and Martin Bashir was praising the virtues of the Qur’an, and it was Sean O’Malley, the Cardinal Archbishop of Boston, who cautioned against taking revenge and decried the “perversion” of Islam that led to the bombings.

It is hard to say why Cardinal O’Malley was so confident that the bombers were perverting Islam, despite the Qur’an’s many commands to Muslims to commit acts of violence against unbelievers (2:190-193; 4:89; 9:5; 9:29; 47:4; etc.). It is likely, however, that he simply believes what he has been told about this question: that Islam is a religion of peace, and that those who commit acts of violence in its name are twisting and hijacking the beautiful, peaceful teachings of the religion.

And that’s the problem with this pervasive media denial. The Atlantic Wire asked why it mattered that the bombers were Muslim. It’s a fair question. It matters because the fact that they were Muslims is not incidental to what they did. There’s this thing called “jihad,” you see. It’s an Islamic doctrine involving warfare against unbelievers. The likelihood is that some others might want to wage jihad against Americans as well. And so the more we know about it, the better prepared we can be to defend ourselves.

But the more we lie to ourselves and each other about what this jihad is really all about, the more we enable people like Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. We cannot possibly defeat an enemy whom we refuse to understand, refuse to study, refuse to listen to because he explains why he is our enemy in terms that we can’t bear hearing. That’s why this media obfuscation is nothing short of criminal. And it will bear much more fruit of the kind it bore on the sunny day of the Boston Marathon.

F-k you Racist Tinfoil Rim-Station Freak Walter James Casper III. We've read the idiot Temple-Raston's transcript and find it badly wanting, indeed, evil. As are you. Progressives will do anything but look the cold hard facts in the face. We have a Muslim jihadi problem in the U.S. Americans can't deny it. We must fight it. You are with us or you're not. That is you're American or you're not. And we know the answer to that.

P.S. I don't read your blog, you asshat. I read your Twitter feed. I clicked your blog for the quotes. It's you who's lying, not me. You're a liar and a despicable terror-enabling ghoul and you'll go to hell for your anti-Americanism.

'Democracy May Have Had Its Day'

At the Wall Street Journal, "The Weekend Interview with Donald Kagan":

Donald Kagan is engaging in one last argument. For his "farewell lecture" here at Yale on Thursday afternoon, the 80-year-old scholar of ancient Greece—whose four-volume history of the Peloponnesian War inspired comparisons to Edward Gibbon's Roman history—uncorked a biting critique of American higher education.

Universities, he proposed, are failing students and hurting American democracy. Curricula are "individualized, unfocused and scattered." On campus, he said, "I find a kind of cultural void, an ignorance of the past, a sense of rootlessness and aimlessness." Rare are "faculty with atypical views," he charged. "Still rarer is an informed understanding of the traditions and institutions of our Western civilization and of our country and an appreciation of their special qualities and values." He counseled schools to adopt "a common core of studies" in the history, literature and philosophy "of our culture." By "our" he means Western.

This might once have been called incitement. In 1990, as dean of Yale College, Mr. Kagan argued for the centrality of the study of Western civilization in an "infamous" (his phrase) address to incoming freshmen. A storm followed. He was called a racist—or as the campus daily more politely editorialized, a peddler of "European cultural arrogance."

Not so now. Mr. Kagan received a long standing ovation from students and alumni in the packed auditorium. Heading into retirement, he has been feted as a beloved and popular teacher and Yale icon. The PC wars of the 1990s feel dated. Maybe, as one undergrad told me after the lecture, "the pendulum has started to swing back" toward traditional values in education.

Mr. Kagan offers another explanation. "You can't have a fight," he says one recent day at his office, "because you don't have two sides. The other side won."

Continue reading.

Rush to Judgment: Dina Temple-Raston 'Scoffed' at Possibility of 'Saudi National' Suspected in #Boston Bombing

Terror enabling troll rights harasser Walter James Casper III continues to lie about the media's disgusting rush-to-judgment blaming conservatives for the Boston terror attack.

For some reason, adult sick f-k loser (ASFL) Repsac3 insists that what Ms. Temple-Raston actually said doesn't matter, and thus he can just keep spinning this lie about how she was "reporting" the news rather than spewing hateful racist attacks on conservatives.

Folks can find Racist Repsac3's racist blog post on Google: "Creepy-clown Stalker Donald Kent Douglas Doubles Down on Media Conspiracy Theory." But one more time: No government official claimed that right wing conservatives were motivated to launch a terrorist attack on Boston, on April 15th, because of Adolf Hitler's birthday. That is plain nutbag conspiracy theorizing and it's disgusting, but that's Racist Repsac3 for you, the sick f-k. Of course, readers will recall that NPR's Steve Inskeep reported on how Temple-Raston "scoffed" at the idea that the suspect was a "Saudi national" --- you know, because we're just fresh out of Saudi Muslims inspired by the Saudi-based teachings of al Qaeda, or some such sh-t like that.

No, for racist conspiracy racist Walter James Casper III, Temple-Raston was "reporting" the news, like a prime-time evening news segment, not commenting on the news on an extreme left-wing NPR commentary show for an extreme left-wing NPR audience. Seriously. Folks can read the transcript. Temple-Raston was interviewed for NPR's commentary show "All Things Considered." Temple-Raston was spewing racist nutbag conspiracies about bulls-t Nazi birthdays being celebrated by the far right. In other words, she's speculating. The transcript is right here in all of its tin hat glory: "Boston Marathon Bombing Case Gains Momentum."

I know. This is some whacked sh-t, but that's Racist Rim-Station Repsac3 for you.

Stoaty Weasel's got his number, and how, "We set fire to a gypsy. You?:

“April is a big month for anti-government and right-wing individuals. There’s the Columbine anniversary, there’s Hitler’s birthday, there’s the Oklahoma City bombing, the assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco.”

–NPR’s Dina Temple-Raston, speculating that the Boston Marathon bombers were home grown (before the Tsarnaev brothers started shooting up the place, obviously).

Okay. Wow. Let’s take those in reverse order. “…the assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco…” was a really horrible episode in our history, in which a house full of religious nutcases were burned alive by federal agents for no good reason. It did indeed horrify all kinds of people, and someone out on the “here be dragons” fringe of the right did indeed retaliate with the Oklahoma City bombing. Which is a desperate embarrassment to the third or so of the country that is in the mainstream right and has been used as a stick to beat us for twenty years. It is not a day for celebration in any way, shape or form.

But…wait…dear lord, Hitler’s birthday?!? If you turned America upside down and shook her hard, I bet fewer than a hundred genuine neo-Nazis would fall out. A kind of right wing, I guess, because they always say so. But just…really, NPR?

Whoa, hang on, the Columbine anniversary? The hell? Two punk kids shoot up their high school? That’s not even…there’s nothing…that’s not right, left or anything. That’s just. No.

This all happened last week, obviously, when nobody knew nothing. Which is why I didn’t post about it then. I was in no mood.

Is it too much to ask our publicly-funded media not to accuse me of Hitler worship? And they wonder why we talk about defunding them every time we get a majority.

"The hell" is right.

Temple-Raston was shamelessly smearing conservatives ---- all while refusing to consider the possible legitimacy that an Islamic terrorist from Saudi Arabia might have been the perpetrator. Nope. It had to be a bunch of fanatical right wingers celebrating Hitler's birthday.

Whoopi. Let's sing the Horst Wessel song and blow the legs off beautiful 8-year-old American boys --- because that's right in the f-king wheelhouse of conservative right wing individuals!

My god. We've reached a milestone in Repsac III's troll rights harassment blogging: Walter James Casper III = Certified NPR Tinfoil Conspiracy Crackpot.

Get some help motherf-ker.

Death Tolls Passes 300 in Bangladesh Building Collapse

At the Wall Street Journal, "Arrests Ordered in Bangladesh Disaster: Officials Seek Factory Owners as Death Toll in Collapse Passes 300 and Anger Swells Over Building Safety and Pace of Rescue":

DHAKA, Bangladesh—Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina ordered arrests over the collapse of a factory complex here this week after tens of thousands of workers staged at-times violent protests and police clashed with victims' families angry over the pace of the search for survivors.

Workers pulled 100 more survivors from the rubble of the Rana Plaza building on Friday, drawing cheers from onlookers with each rescue, as the death toll rose to at least 306. Rescuers estimated the toll could jump by at least one hundred once the search phase ends and bulldozers start removing bodies.

Citing criminal negligence, Ms. Hasina on Friday ordered the arrests of the man who built and owns the complex, Sohel Rana, because of the building's condition, and of the owners of all five garment factories housed there for ordering employees back to work after cracks appeared in the building's exterior on Tuesday, her spokesman said. Arrest orders of factory owners are extremely rare here. One factory owner was arrested in 2005 in a building collapse that killed 68, but wasn't convicted. Factory owners wield huge political clout in a country that employs hundreds of thousands of garment workers making clothes for Western retailers.

It remains to be seen whether authorities will charge and prosecute the owners over the Rana Plaza incident or abandon the case once public anger has died down. Two of the factory owners turned themselves in to authorities early Saturday, Bangladesh media reported.

More at that top link.

More Plane Debris Found Near Ground Zero

At Atlas Shrugs, "MORE LANDING GEAR FROM 9/11 PLANE FOUND NEAR SITE OF PLANNED GROUND ZERO MOSQUE."

Read all of Pamela's piece at that link.

And at the New York Times, "11 Years Later, Debris From Plane Is Found Near Ground Zero":

It was wedged in a narrow, inaccessible space between two buildings, about three blocks from the World Trade Center site. And there it remained, hidden from view, for more than 11 years. Ground zero slowly gave way to a new tower. Protesters gathered nearby, angry over a planned Islamic center.

But this week, land surveyors happened upon it — a piece of a plane’s landing gear, apparently belonging to one of the two jets that slammed into the twin towers on Sept. 11, 2001, the police said.

On Wednesday, around 11 a.m., the surveyors called 911 to say they had found a piece of damaged machinery. What the police discovered was a component about 5 feet high, 3 feet wide and about 17 inches in depth. It was lodged in the narrow gap between 50 Murray Street, a residential building, and 51 Park Place, which is empty. There, it had been “out of sight and out of mind for over a decade,” the Police Department’s chief spokesman, Paul J. Browne, said on Friday.

That area is inaccessible from the street, Mr. Browne said, adding that a tiny door opens into the corridor from a neighboring building.

“The odds of it entering that space at exactly that angle that would permit it to squeeze in there,” he said, “it had to come in at almost precisely the right angle.”

Of course, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly had to throw out the possibility that the gear had been lowered into that spot by hand, because no doubt everyone wants to lower a piece of jet machinery into a crevice between some buildings a couple of blocks from a terrorist attack site, or something.

'Kon-Tiki'

This is interesting. I read Thor Heyerdahl's book when I was in elementary school.

A review from Kenneth Turan, at the Los Angeles Times, "Review: 'Kon-Tiki' a tale retold of determined seafarers":

Based on the 1947 book of the same name, six men attempt to cross the ocean on a raft to prove Polynesians originated in pre-Inca Peru centuries ago. Thor Heyerdahl was the fearless leader, and this film captures the journey and the man in thrilling detail.

More video here.

George W. Bush Speech at Dedication of Presidential Library

President Bush got choked up at the end of his speech. A great man and a great presidency. I'm looking forward to visiting his presidential library.

Highlights from the event at CNN, "Presidential library leaves Bush teary-eyed."

And see Joseph Curl, at the Washington Times, "W Outclasses Barack and Bill Without Even Trying":

DALLAS — Shortly after Barack Obama was elected in 2008, a fellow reporter who'd covered President George W. Bush all eight years told me she'd had enough of the travel and stress and strain of the White House beat, that she was moving on. We reminisced about all the places we'd been, all the crazy days and wild nights, all the history we'd seen — first hand. Just before we said our goodbyes, I asked her if she'd miss covering President Obama.

"Not at all. He's an inch deep. Bush is a bottomless chasm, a deep, mysterious, emotional, profound man. Obama is all surface — shallow, obvious, robotic, and, frankly, not nearly as smart as he thinks. Bush was the one."

Her words, so succinct, have stuck with me ever since. By the way, she's a hardcore Democrat.

But she was right. And that contrast was apparent to all who watched Thursday's ceremonial event to open W's new presidential library in Dallas. The class and grace and depth of America's last president completely outshined that of his successor (who, coincidentally, or perhaps not, was the only one seated in the shade on a sunny Texas day)...

Continue reading.

Also, "Watch The Battle Hymn of the Republic performed by the U.S. Army Chorus."

Zubeidat Tsarnaeva Made Terrorism Watch List in 2011

At Jammie Wearing Fools, "Surprise! Psycho Mother of Boston Bombers Also on Terror Watch List."

And the Wall Street Journal, "Suspects' Mother Was Placed on Watch List":

MAKHACHKALA, Russia—The mother of the two young men alleged to have plotted and carried out the Boston Marathon bombing was placed on the same classified watch list as her elder son, according to U.S. officials, raising further questions about her role in his apparent radicalization.

Zubeidat Tsarnaeva and her son Tamerlan were placed at the same time in late 2011 on the Terror Identities Datamart Environment database, a low-level watch list that contains the names of more than 500,000 people flagged by multiple U.S. security agencies. It wasn't clear why she was placed on the list.

Her presence on the list is one more thing Ms. Tsarnaeva shared with Tamerlan, who is believed to have masterminded the marathon bombing.

Earlier in the week, after insisting in a two-hour interview with The Wall Street Journal that Tamerlan had been framed, Ms. Tsarnaeva said strife in her family had arisen from its ultimately unsuccessful attempt to adjust to American life. "We never should have come to America," she said. "We tried, but I wouldn't do it again."

Ms. Tsarnaeva said in the interview she often surfed many of the same Internet sites as her son, as the two exchanged ideas on religion and adopted more orthodox Islamic practices. She denied that she or her son adopted any extremist ideologies, however. Now back in Russia living with her husband, Anzor, she said she doesn't know when she will be able come to the U.S. to see her remaining son, Dzhokhar, who was moved Friday from a Boston hospital to a prison medical facility. While the Tsarnaevs had talked about traveling this week to Boston, Ms. Tsarnaeva now says that U.S. officials who came to see them in Makhachkala said they would not for now have the opportunity to see Dzhokhar. She also says she would like to stay closer to relatives. Mr. Tsarnaev has said he will go to the U.S., but he hasn't said when.

Ms. Tsarnaeva also faces a warrant for her arrest in the U.S. after failing to show up for an October court appearance on charges she shoplifted seven dresses at a suburban Boston department store, according to court records. Ms. Tsarnaeva is charged with one count of larceny and two counts of vandalizing property because several of the dresses were damaged in the alleged June 30, 2012, incident at a Lord & Taylor in Natick, Mass., according to court records.

Authorities are still pursuing the case and would arrest her if given the opportunity, a spokeswoman for the Middlesex County District Attorney's Office said Friday.

Continue reading.

And ICYMI, "America's Insane Asylum for Jihadists, Hustlers and Frauds."

Whoo! Luscious Julianne Hough Bikini Shots

She looks great.

At London's Daily Mail, "Has she been on the heartbreak diet? Newly single Julianne Hough appears much slimmer in a bikini after putting on 20lbs while dating ex-Seacrest."

President Infanticide Speaks at 2013 Planned Parenthood National Conference

At the Wall Street Journal, "Obama Praises Work of Planned Parenthood."

And at Life News, "Obama Ignores Kermit Gosnell Murder Trial in Planned Parenthood Speech."

Naturally, he wouldn't mention Gosnell. Both President Obama and Planned Parenthood endorse the exact same baby-killing evil as the accused murderer. See, "Planned Parenthood's Defense of Infanticide." And, "The Secret Life of Senator Infanticide." (Now President Infanticide.)

Bush Kept Us Safe; Obama, Not So Much

From Charles Krauthammer, at the Washington Post, "The Bush legacy":

Clare Boothe Luce liked to say that “a great man is one sentence.” Presidents, in particular. The most common “one sentence” for George W. Bush is: “He kept us safe.”

Not quite right. With Bush’s legacy being reassessed as his presidential library opens in Dallas, it’s important to note that he did not just keep us safe. He created the entire anti-terror infrastructure that continues to keep us safe.

That homage was paid, wordlessly, by Barack Obama, who vilified Bush’s anti-terror policies as a candidate, then continued them as president: indefinite detention, rendition, warrantless wiretaps, special forces and drone warfare, and, most notoriously, Guantanamo, which Obama so ostentatiously denounced — until he found it indispensable.

Quite a list. Which is why there was not one successful terror bombing on U.S. soil from 9/11 until last week. The Boston Marathon attack was an obvious security failure, but there is a difference between 3,000 dead and three. And on the other side of the ledger are the innumerable plots broken up since 9/11.

Moreover, Bush’s achievement was not just infrastructure. It was war. The Afghan campaign overthrew the Taliban, decimated al-Qaeda and expelled it from its haven. Yet that success is today derogated with the cheap and lazy catchphrase — “He got us into two wars” — intended to spread to Afghanistan the opprobrium associated with Iraq.

As if Afghanistan was some unilateral Bush adventure foisted on the American people. As if Obama himself did not call it a “war of necessity” and Joe Biden, the most just war since World War II.

The dilemma in Afghanistan was what to do after the brilliant, nine-week victory. There was no good answer. Even with the benefit of seven years’ grinding experience under his predecessor, Obama got it wrong. His Afghan “surge” cost hundreds of American lives without having changed the country’s prospects.

It turned out to be a land too primitive to democratize, too fractured to unify. The final withdrawal will come after Obama’s own six years of futility.

Continue reading.

The author slams Obama for his complete ineptitude, his complete deliberate abandonment of the hard won gains in security and stability in place at the time of Bush's departure of office. The last four years have been the among the most devastating for American foreign policy in American history. Obama has not kept us safe.

Never Before Seen Beatles Photos From 1964

From Leslie Woodhead, at the Daily Beast:

They’re one of the most documented bands ever, but once and a while we get to see them in a new light. Documentary filmmaker Leslie Woodhead uncovered these photos he took of the Fab Four back in 1964 when they were recording in Manchester. He tells the story of the photographs in an excerpt from his new book, How the Beatles Rocked the Kremlin.

Richie Havens: 'Here Comes the Sun...'

Via William Jacobson, "RIP – Richie Havens."

Also at Rolling Stone, "Richie Havens, Folk Icon, Dead at 72."

The Evil in Boston

From Bret Stephens, at the Wall Street Journal:

I have my own experience of what a bombing of this sort looks like. In January 2004 I was living in Jerusalem when a suicide bomber blew himself up on a bus down the street from my apartment. I was on the scene in about three minutes.

"The ground was covered in glass; every window of the bus had been blasted," I wrote later that day. "Inside the wreckage, I could see three very still corpses and one body that rocked back and forth convulsively. Outside the bus, another three corpses were strewn on the ground, one face-up, two face-down. There was a large piece of torso ripped from its body, which I guessed was the suicide bomber's. Elsewhere on the ground, more chunks of human flesh: a leg, an arm, smaller bits, pools of blood."

Rereading these lines all these years later, I'm struck by how far they fall short of capturing my memory of the event, of the experience of it. But human carnage is beyond description, a fact known mainly to those—now including several hundred people in Boston—who have seen it for themselves. To see it is to understand it; to understand it is to have no real words for it.

Gawker Won't Take Down Videotape of Hulk Hogan Bonking His Friend's Ex-Wife

This is the link at Mediagazer, "A Judge Told Us to Take Down Our Hulk Hogan Sex Tape Post. We Won't."

Gawker's John Cook is the biggest scumbag, and I really do mean the freakin' biggest scumbag. Still, this is quite the unusual story:

We publish all manner of stories here. Some are serious, some are frivolous, some are dumb. I am not going to make a case that the future of the Republic rises or falls on the ability of the general public to watch a video of Hulk Hogan fucking his friend's ex-wife. But the Constitution does unambiguously accord us the right to publish true things about public figures. And Campbell's order requiring us to take down not only a very brief, highly edited video excerpt from a 30-minute Hulk Hogan fucking session but also a lengthy written account from someone who had watched the entirety of that fucking session, is risible and contemptuous of centuries of First Amendment jurisprudence.

Head back over to Mediagazer to read it all.

Need a refresher on John Cook? Here you go: "John Cook, Dude Trying to Out CIA Agent Who [Helped Kill] Bin Laden, Married to Anti-Zionist Allison Benedikt*."

Like I said: The dude's the scum of all scum. I couldn't care less what happens to that sex tape, although I'm not at all bothered by the pain and harassment the court is raining down on that sleazebag.

Bombers' Mother Zubeidat Tsarnaeva Press Conference: 'America took my kids away from me...'

The jihad mom, via BCF, "Video: Mother of Boston bomb suspects berates US authorities - America Took My Kids Away From Me!"

Also at USA Today, "Bomb suspects' mother will 'never' accept their guilt."

I thought she didn't care if her son died? Allahu Akbar!

Gwyneth Paltrow — 'World's Most Beautiful Woman' — Shows Off Smokin' See-Through Mesh Panel Gown at Hollywood Premiere of 'Iron Man 3'

Ms. Paltrow was named People's 2013 "Most Beautiful Woman," but the big news is this sheer number she stepped out in Wednesday at the 'Iron Man 3' premiere at the El Capitan Theatre in Los Angeles.

See London's Daily Mail, "Gwyneth Paltr-WOW! Iron Man 3 star stuns in dress with entirely sheer side panels (and no underwear) at film premiere."

Oh, and I guess the "Most Beautiful Woman" thing didn't go over too well on Twitter: "Gwyneth Paltrow is crowned the world's most beautiful woman - and then it all turns ugly on Twitter."

The "most beautiful"? Meh. Who cares? She looks great and the "Iron Man" films are smokin'!

Live it up, baby!

Sophisticated Bomb Design Indicates Tamerlan Tsarnaev May Have Received Weapons Training in Chechnya

Because, of course there wasn't any international planning, or some such shit like that.

At the Los Angeles Times, "Boston bombs showed some expertise: Investigators say the triggering devices used suggest the older brother received guidance on his recent trip to Russia":

Investigators say the triggering devices used suggest the older brother received guidance on his recent trip to Russia
":WASHINGTON — Investigators said the two Boston Marathon bombs were triggered by long-range remote controls for toy cars — a more sophisticated design than originally believed — bolstering a theory that the older suspect received bomb-making guidance on his six-month trip to Russia last year.
Tamerlan Tsarnaev, who died in a shootout with police last week, "more than likely got some instruction in Dagestan," a federal law enforcement official said Wednesday.

The official said investigators continued to believe that Tsarnaev, 26, and his brother, Dzhokhar, 19, were radicalized in the U.S., and that no foreign terrorist group orchestrated the plot.

Nevertheless, the CIA revealed Wednesday that it had asked the FBI and other federal agencies to put Tamerlan Tsarnaev on the terrorism watch list in October 2011 after receiving information from Russia. His name was not placed on a no-fly list, but it was circulated to various intelligence and domestic security agencies.

The information the CIA received "was nearly identical to the information the FBI received in March 2011" from Russia, one official said — unspecific allegations that he had become an Islamic extremist.

The CIA shared all the information provided by the foreign government including two possible dates of birth, his name and a possible name variant as well, an official said.

FBI and Russian security services have been conducting interviews separately in the Dagestan area since the Tsarnaev brothers became suspects in the bombings last week, according to a federal law enforcement official. The agencies are talking to Tsarnaev family members, including the father of the brothers.

The officials asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to discuss the investigation.

Further suggesting that Tamerlan Tsarnaev's Russia trip played a role, Secretary of State John F. Kerry told reporters Wednesday in Brussels that the elder suspect "learned something where he went, and he came back with a willingness to kill people."

A joint FBI and Department of Homeland Security intelligence bulletin sent to state and local law enforcement Tuesday night suggested that the bombs' triggering mechanism was more sophisticated than previously thought.

"The sophistication of the explosive devices is similar to what you might find on a battlefield, and I am concerned there is a person out there, either in the Chechen region or in the United States, who trained him," Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said in a statement.


"For anyone to rule out a foreign connection at this time, I think is highly premature," he said.

America's Insane Asylum for Jihadists, Hustlers and Frauds

A commentary from Michelle Malkin:

In the aftermath of the Boston Marathon killing spree by foreign-born jihadists, see-no-evil bureaucrats in Washington are stubbornly defending America’s lax asylum policies. DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano told the Senate Tuesday that the screening process is rigorous, effective and extensive.

These people can’t handle the truth. Or tell it.

The Tsarnaev brothers reportedly were granted asylum by “derivative” status through their parents. After entering on short-term tourist visas, the mother and father (an ethnic Chechen Muslim) won asylum and acquired U.S. citizenship. Next, younger son Dzhokhar obtained U.S. citizenship. Older son Tamerlan, whose naturalization application was pending, traveled freely between the U.S. and the jihad recruitment zone of Dagestan, Russia, last year before the bombers’ gunfight in Watertown, Mass., last week left the Muslim terrorist dead.

[Sidenote: They all received taxpayer-funded welfare benefits, too. No surprise. Did you know jihad preachers have urged their followers to collect welfare bennies while plotting terror?]

Though they had convinced the U.S. that they faced deadly persecution, the Tsarnaevs’ parents both returned to their native land and were there when their sons launched last week’s terror rampage. Authorities will not reveal any details of the sob stories the Tsarnaevs originally spun to win asylum benefits for the entire family.

The whole thing stinks. And it’s an old, familiar stench. Immigration lawyers have been working the system on behalf of asylum con artists for decades. The racketeers coach applicants with phony stories and documents from “chop shops” and game their way through “refugee roulette.”

Continue reading.

And don't skip Michelle's interview with Hannity at that clip. Outstanding.

After Tweeting Wishes for 'White American' Bomber, Despicable Terror Enabler Walter James Casper III Denies Leftist Bias in #Boston Marathon Reporting

Repsac3, professional progressive troll and rim-station rim master, is lying again.

After getting hammered the other day, the idiot troll rights harasser posted an entry even more stupid than his usual level of stupidity: "Note to Media Bias Hunters on the Right..." Folks can Google it if they want.

Rim-Station Repsac claims that NPR's Dina Temple Raston was only relying on official statements when she falsely claimed the Boston bombing was likely the work of the far right, because:

April is a big month for anti-government, and right-wing individuals. There's the Columbine anniversary. There's Hitler's birthday. There's the Oklahoma City bombing. The assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco."

Actually, no.

No official agency claimed that celebration of "Hitler's birthday" on the right was a possible catalyst for the Boston attack or any such shit. She's commenting, not reporting. I repeat Temple Raston is just spewing her own hateful prejudices. She offers no evidence for her claims. That is, without a shred of substantiation, she drops the idea of "officials said such and such" and that the "FBI is comparing this or that" as the prelude to deranged smears that have been universally repudiated in the press. Only someone as mental as Walter James Casper III would defend such proven, despicable lies and hatred.

Troll harasser Repsac claims that any reporter would be looking at "other possibilities" like "Islamist extremism" in addition to alleged right wing fanatics, blah, blah... But Temple Raston wasn't looking at "other possibilities." Morning host Steve Inskeep, her colleague at NPR, reported that Temple Raston "scoffed" at the thought of a possible Muslim suspect from Saudia Arabia: "Asked about 'Saudi national' off-air, @nprdina scoffed."

But facts don't matter to Walter James "Rim-Station" Casper III. Moreover, as I reported earlier, it's not just stupidity with depraved people like "Hatesac3." There's a fundamental embrace of evil that drives people like this, manifest by a pathological aversion to decency and truth.

At the video from Tuesday night is Sean Hannity segment on the left's "Rush to Judgment," which includes examples of leftist media outlets completely falling over themselves in blame-righty fits. After the introductory video collage, Juan Williams admits that Hannity's piece is "on to something" about the left's faux journalistic attacks on conservatives --- and Williams is a way left-of-center defender of the Obama administration who usually smacks down Hannity's attacks on the left, not to mention Bill O'Reilly's. But I like Williams. He's got a core of decency and honesty that people like the violently hateful harasser Walter "Rim-Station" Repsac badly lacks.

And remember, Walter James Casper III tweeted out the universally disparaged racist David Sirota's "white American bomber" hit piece. See: "'Emotionally, it is very hard for me to consider such ilk as fellow Americans, let alone as decent human beings...'."

Racist Rim-Station Repsac3 is a vile troll who should be blocked, banned and reported to the authorities for his criminal and hateful harassment and debauchery.